Big Weekend for “Keeping the May River Wild”
It’s been an exciting few months for “Keeping the May River Wild,” the multimedia documentary that grew from my master’s degree project and years spent paddling and photographing our unique estuary system. The excitement will build this weekend when the documentary will compete at the Macon (Ga.) Film Festival and be honored with the Southern Lens Award at the Beaufort Film Festival.
The video will screen in Macon’s Douglas Theatre at 5 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 18, and in the Macon Marriott Center at 9 a.m, on Sunday, Feb. 21. I will share some thoughts and be available for questions following the Thursday showing. In Beaufort, I will also be available following a 9:15 a.m. screening on Saturday, Feb. 20, at Seaside Vineyard Fellowship (formerly Lady’s Island Cinema), and my photographs will be available for purchase in the lobby. I’ll receive the Southern Lens Award from SC-ETV at the Beaufort Film Festival awards ceremony on Saturday night. Best-selling author Pat Conroy, actress Blythe Danner and actor Michael O’Keefe are also set to receive awards from the festival organizers.
Meantime, “Keeping the May River Wild” has been playing to rave reviews at community gatherings in Bluffton, on Hilton Head Island and in Beaufort. Many folks leaving presentations have pledged to change their lawn-care and storm-water-management habits. More local showings are scheduled, I’m set to present an Earth Day workshop in Baltimore and the documentary has been entered in another dozen festivals across the country. It aired for several months on The Beaufort County Channel, and it will air in the coming year on SC-ETV’s Southern Lens. In September, the project was named among the Best of ASMP 2009.
